jealousy | More Than Dodgeball

Josh GriffinMore Posts HSM Weekend in Review: Volume 205

Weekend Teaching Series: Instalife (series premiere, week 1 of 2)
Service Length: 70 minutes

Understandable Message: This weekend we used the app Instagram as a backdrop for a new series in HSM. This week we focused on jealousy – how Instagram brings out the best and the worst in us in that area. We talked about jealousy from Jesus teachings in Matthew 6 and had lots of fun along the way. One of my favorite weekends in HSM in a very long time – I think a good message, great game, fun look/feel and super relevant and easy to connect with our student’s world.

Element of Fun/Positive Environment: We played a brand new game called InstaHack – where we bring someone on stage and have them log into their Instagram and then spin the wheel for us to various terrible things to their pictures, followers and feed. They could also win $5 Starbucks giftcards if they were extremely lucky. Super, super fun, crowd died at the right points, and the contestants were always a good sport. We also had lots of student greeters and a fun Christmas rap video.

Music Playlist: Silent Night (Taylor Swift version), Go, Joy to the World, 10,000 Reasons, Your Love is Strong

Favorite Moment: During one part of the talk I called out one of our students (I had his permission, more or less) and talked about #selfies. It was a great moment that I loved and

Up next: Instalife (week 2 of 2)

1 View Comments December 11, 2012

Josh GriffinMore Posts InstaLife Series Arc

Excited to start a new series in HSM next weekend called InstaLife – it will use Instagram as a backdrop to teach biblical truths. Pretty excited about the series! I like it when we create an “arc” or journey we are hoping to take students through both in each message and the series. Here’s an overview of the next two weeks:

InstaLife: Jealousy – Wanting Someone Else’s Username
Being jealous shows that we are not satisfied with what God has given us, that what we have is not enough. The Bible tells us that we need to be content with what we have because God would never forsake us and leave us with nothing. In order to go head to head with jealousy we need to become more like Jesus and less like ourselves. We need to stop wanting and ogling what everyone else posts through Instagram.

InstaLife: Being Fake – Look Behind the Filter
We post pictures online for everyone to see. We will post pictures on this app to allow other people to get a little glimpse into our lives. Many post pictures of the life they wish they had or pictures from only the good parts, giving the false perception to everyone who sees it thinking that you are just fine and dandy when in reality you are truly hurting. It is time to stop pretending that everything is okay and come to Jesus get out from behind the filter.

JG

Add Comment December 6, 2012

Josh GriffinMore Posts Why You Plan the Teaching Calendar in Advance

In December HSM is gong to do a series call Instalife about jealousy, pretending and bragging – talking through what the Bible says on these very important subjects. I happened to stumble on an article (poorly titled, but oh well) on the very subject on Gizmodo that is absolutely perfect research for my message. You can certainly read the whole article, but my favorite part of it being the list of questions the author put at the end:

Am I sharing this picture only because I want people to wish they were where I am?
Am I someplace expensive? Is it obvious?
Am I someplace nobody else was invited? Do they wish they were invited?
Am I posting this only because I want people to like it? Or like me?
Am I posting this only because it makes me look good?
Am I posting myself and explicitly stating how good I look?
Am I a nice person?
Have I called my parents lately?
Did my parents get divorced because of me?
Did my parents stay together because of me?
Do I know for sure that my ex follows me on Instagram and I want to make sure she sees this so she’ll regret it—oh, how she’ll regret it all!
If I saw what I’m about to share, would I roll my eyes?
Can I imagine anyone commenting, on this picture, “Ahhh I’m so jealous! I hate u!”
Is this an Instaboast?

Now … this is a completely secular article but points out some great truths for me to now use in my message. If I didn’t know roughly what I was teaching on I wouldn’t know to collect stuff like this right now. If I’m preparing a “Saturday night special” talk for my audience on Sunday morning, they’ll never be as good as when I prepare in advance.

Let me spell it out rapid fire if it isn’t obvious: